The Welcome Mat's Free Pattern of The Month

This note card is available to purchase from Acorn Designs

Today I was out in the woods and I was inspired by grape leaves and raisin grapes on the vine. I decided to hunt up a round pattern I'd drawn for a class on using dip dyes/casserole dyes, wool that changes from one colour to another. It is now the October free pattern on the Mat. If you are interested in a the free patterns, 10 to date....and one each month ... join the Mat

I love the colour way on the note card! This might work for the pattern and didn't the some of Birdie marvelizing look like it might work?

Though my grapes were deep purple and withered, the leaves look the same.

It was snowing and raining and the sun was shining on our walk- well we had about all 4 seasons at once as we walked MoMo all over the place, well truthfully he ran.

I was too busy looking and being inspired. He is more of an olfactory guy.

I like this poster!

I really like this poster but it has a few value problems.

The top says:

I can't is a quitter

I don't know is lazy

I wish I could is a wisher

The rest is much easier to read.

Why did't they change the font colour a few values , like 4, to make it darker in the light sky?

DUH

Maybe there is more than a surface lesson here for us!

Guarding the Marvelizing

Here are some of the marvelized pieces Birdie was sleeping on the other day, as you can see she hasn't given them up quite yet. I got some very nice neutrals.

Below are the lighter ones and you can see Birdie is on the prowl at the edge of the photo. If you are wondering why these ones are so dramatic, we processed them in the oven

Here is the existing stock of 8s just wait to be excited by the new ones below!

You are here

You are not here merely to make a living. You are here to enable the world to live more amply, with greater vision, and with a finer spirit of hope and achievement. You are here to enrich the world. You impoverish yourself if you forget this errand.Woodrow Wilson
Today as I was dyeing some co-ordin8s to make a living I found this in my wool pile:
Mary tries to get some rest in a wooley hideaway.She looks a little cross.

Look how concerned Birdie appears as she lays upon the Co-ordin8s and a giant pile of amazing marvelizing. Whatever is going on?

Here is a clue:

We are dog sitting handsome Mr. Momo who treats the girls like glass.

They all get along except when Mo starts running around then all Siamese go to ground.

Those wondering about Celie, she is sleeping in a dark room on a mohair blanket and cannot be roused not even by a laser light.

Pictures of marvelizing tomorrow...

Colour Themes... What?

This Art work by Rob Gonsalves plays with structure themes, there is a point where imagination can crossover

This recent question from my online studio class on Design is so good I decided to share it with you.

Are there types of color themes or is a color theme anything a person decides to put together?

Dear Student,

This is a great question. You can substitute the phrase "colour plan " for theme.

I will only use the words theme or colour plan if the colours in it respond well and are pleasing to look at, indicating they were deliberated on.

Ideally a theme isn't just a thrown together assortment of colours. Instead they are a carefully planned out collection of colours that tell the story of that theme to the viewer.

If you watch HGTV you might hear and see people being encouraged to have a ideal they are shooting for, like victorian or french country or italian villa. All of these have a certain "look" including furniture shapes, textiles types, decorations, window treatments, etc.

When I talk about colour themes I'm talking about the same thing.

Throughout history artists have combined colours in ways we find pleasing.

Now in our society we are inundated with themed colour use every where. Magazines are planned with colour themes, cloth, cards, paper, linens, ads, furniture. EVERYTHING manmade we buy has been colour planned. It has a theme.

I frequently use McDonalds as an example of this planning. Bright yellow, red, white with a hint of blue.

Now imagine if I used this theme for a rug, not McDonalds itself but the colours of McDonalds. Would I be able to include a bit of Barbie's theme colours ... bright pink, into this mix easily?

I bet not. I would be mixing my themes.

These colour themes are not related in any way.

Sometimes it is possible to use two themes, like Santa Fe colours and Fall woodland colours, they have a couple of crossovers- brown, orange.

This is why it is so easy to pop turquoise as poison into a fall woodland theme. It fits.

You can decide to put any colour with any colour, in my experience it seldom is successful.

To me it is like deciding to write a book without pondering it further than this; you need words right?

So just grab some random assorted ones out of the dictionary, type them up, don't worry if it doesn't make sense ...

It is fine colour craft the colour theme stands for, the art of using colour wonderfully.

If this didn't answer your question let me know!

Wanda

An invitation to play

Creativity is about play and a kind of willingness to go with your intuition. It’s crucial to an artist. If you know where you are going and what you are going to do, why do it?— Frank Gehry

Big Beauty Iris finds a home!

And believe it or not here what she is to become:

I was at Susan Feller's home recently and saw a piece of wool she bought from you. An exquisite piece moving from one complex color area to another.

I am a rughooker and, of course, love using beautifully dyed wool in my pieces. But a piece of wool like the one Susan has should live on its own. I would like to hang it on the wall or drape it over the back of a couch or drape it across a table.

And now Iris is hers... interesting trend eh? The big beauts get off the floor and onto the wall!

I told them not to drink so much !!

Three Geniuses touch my life

Geniuses, they are there waiting to be seen and heard if we would only clean out our ears and wipe the dust from our eyes.

Genius 1

Look at this amazing picture man took on Monday. Colour perfectly arrayed in complements.

Genius 2

One of my most inspirational friends called last night and told me she mounted one of my dyed wool big beauties on a frame, just as though it was art. I had done this small scale but never LARGE. As Christmas is coming these would be great to add to my roster of stock. Many people say they cannot bear to cut them up, this would be a better function than being stored on a shelf.

Genius 3

Speaking of gifts my other genius, (how can I be so blessed?) suggested that I encourage people to get a Welcome Mat Subscription gift card ready because the price point is so reasonable.

Here is what she said:

"You have a wonderful website and very reasonable subscription rate. It makes a
wonderful "just because I love you" gift. Do you offer gift certificates
for friends or maybe a "Hook-in door prizes" ??? The price point is perfect
for the holidays too! It's a "gift that keeps on giving"!"

I think that's a great idea!

Do you know someone who would love a subscription? Can't do it yourself? Put a bug in their family's ear! Looking for a more extravagant gift, perhaps for yourself? Think of coming to the studio for semi private classes next year, you arrange the time.

You can give without loving, but you can never love without giving. ~Author Unknown

Herd and Scene again

Look at this well executed and powerful felt work by Moy Mackay

The rubbing of like-minded brains is such a wonderful feeling. (Annette Waterbeek)

What do you imagine a rug with this saying might look like?

AND

Gauguin says that when sailors have to move a heavy load or raise an anchor, they all sing together to keep them up and give them vim. That's just what artists lack! (Vincent van Gogh

I'm ready for a hooking sing a long, how bout you?

Thanksgiving dinner- Everyone deserves one

Small things

I love looking at textiles when I have the time and this one from Scotland is intriguing.

It is not so much the overall pattern but the smaller scale of colour interplay and radiating forms there in the background.

This came from Yorke Antique Textiles Click the link and select a bigger image, it is amazing!

You've got to think about big things while you're doing small things, so that all the small things go in the right direction. Alvin Toffler

Yup!

Last Thursday's Hook-in

Marie hooks Wiarton Willie

Barb hooks on her geometric.

Here is Dianne's finished first piece.

Barb and Marie look pretty serious but are happy with the cake

Here is Linda's first piece becoming a cushion.

She plies her handwork on it.

Lorraine is Angelling in her Garden

Here Dianne works on a picture her grand daughter Halle drew to be hooked, Dianne uses a unique wool sorting container meant for crudite.

Erin and Pam missed the photo session by an early leaving to get their children from school!

I'll include them in the next session!

I of course hooked on my you know what rug!! You can see it in a few pictures if you haven't gone stupid from me showing it over and over! I'm practically lapsing into a coma myself!

PS Why is my studio's periphery so chaotic?

I may be justifying my pockets of chaos, but I will always choose people over perfection and the heart over task and tidy. ~Betsy Cañas Garmon

Thank you Betsy!

Excuses Excuses

Excuses are the nails used to build a house of failure. ~Don Wilder and Bill Rechin

OUCH

Well, Yes I have some Don and Bill!

What am I excusing myself for ? I wanted to get my Vogue run dome by September 30.

I didn't make it!

I was feeling a little down about it. Wood came and it needed to be thrown in and piled.

I had company yadda yadda yadda. The fact remains it isn't quite done.

But looking through some pictures today I stumbled on this one:

And it reminded me of how very far I've come in just two months of hooking, last September and this one. I'm doing ok.

All that remains

Will I do it?

Stay tuned...

Coming right up

Yes, the end of the month ( my self imposed due date) and the end of my patience is likely to run out in a few days. I feel like a rug hooking robot as I repeat and repeat and repeat and repaeat, did I tell you I was repeating the same things over and over.

I'm loving the idea of October when the Vogue and I will part ways, at least the close proximity of it on my lap every spare moment.

I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.
Douglas Adams

Colour Play on a journal rug

Sometimes I just love the way colours play together. (I think by the look of it some cats played on this rug too by the amount of cat hair!) Here is a section from my journal rug where I hooked a colour and a shape for every day for a month! It was fun!

Vogue Rounding the Corner - Almost

I'm in the HOOOOOOOMMMMMEEE Stretch!

Antique but still timely

Somebody had enough and hooked this rug!

To it and more rugs and other textiles, go here

Concepts and Creation

Here is a rug ( uncompleted as you can see ) from the way back time machine. It a was a piece did at Teacher's workshop many years ago. Swatches were the material provided but the teacher ran out and I was happy to try another way. This rug looks very different from others in the class and other Paisley Hexes I've seen since. All it took as a teaspoon of daring to be different and accepting a challenge where I might fail.

The problem with the type of teaching in these environments is we create the same things over and over and over without much deviation. This impedes progress.

In a perfect class ( in my mind ) at a teacher's workshop you would be given a pattern and thrown some extremely diverse materials and visual aids for half the day to create a concept that was uniquely yours and the rest of the day would be spent comparing and discussing these possibilities.

This way teachers would go home with 15 ways of doing this project instead of the predictable one way. What fodder we would garner for our lives as teachers this way, what a well spring of delectable fresh water we would drink down and bottle up for our students.

I feel a teacher's school welling up in me! Would you be interested?

It would require you to be open to your creative spirit and the creative spirit of others.

Once you get tuned in to your creative spirit and the feelings it creates, you'll feel it welling up all the time.

Welling up is a great word for this!

I like to tell people creativity is a vast ocean of possibilities, too vast for us to conceive of with our limited imaginations. You can tap into to this ocean or reserve of creativity any time you want. You can take a teaspoon. You can take a tea cup. You can take a bowl or bucketful. You can pump it in, you can build an aqueduct so the supply rushes through you every minute.

It is up to you how much you can use, share or allow yourself to wallow in. You might want to think about how much creativity can tolerate because it can be disturbing at times too.

Maybe you like a notion of the creativity well. You can go there when you have time to drink your fill, so you don't feel frustration from urges and itches you don't have time to scratch.

So many of you are marvellously creative already. You have been all your life and you don't feel the welling up because its always been part of you. Maybe this concept is foreign to you.

Here are some signs you are getting the urge to go to the well or the well is calling you.

You are having a hard time concentrating

You are waking up in the middle of the night.

You feel restless

You might feel lonely, unsatisfied somehow

You need to be by yourself

You think of angles, and can make a decision very quickly

You are hungry

It is time to get ratcheting the bucket down the well.

Get out your tools of choice and give them a whirl. Your creativity needs attention! Your house of invention needs it closets looked into and it's shelves repapered!

Look around you for recurring concepts and themes that are attractive to you

Don't worry about what will happen - just be in the now- make a start

Dare to follow your instincts

Don't rest on your laurels

Step out of the zone of feeling good and put one foot in the zone of unsure

Accept what transpires in your work, love it or just leave it

Look for support from those who can give it.

Make, don't look, read, think, ask ... DO

"In creating, the only hard thing is to begin: a grass blade is no easier to make than an oak."
-- James Russell Lowell

This message has been brought to you from the corporate headquarters of WandaWorks International where the well is never dry but the humour always is!